I was traveling over the summer and talking to people about Thecuriousenior.com. We went to my husband’s 70th birthday party celebration with his high school class. I went to New York City to get my hair cut and meet up with friends. We went to parties in cities and wine tastings in the country. Everywhere, the conversation in the bars and in the fields is the same.
What am I supposed to do with the boxes of my parent’s stuff??
Now it’s the 50-70-somethings who are complaining! Their parents are in their 70-90s and the “kids” are ending up with the stuff that the parents didn’t want to deal with. Often, the parents are still alive and may even be living in the old homestead. Or they may have moved into assisted living or skilled nursing.
Whatever…the result is the same. The “kids” have to deal with the stuff.
Before, I was trying to signal my own age group to think ahead and leave only what has been requested or can easily be disposed of with the resources that exist. This post isn’t about furniture or clothing that can be donated. This is about unopened boxes, where you have no idea what is in them. They may have been in the family basement for years or packed up by the moving or storage company (or maybe the parents themselves) as they moved when they left the house.
Chances are you didn’t have anything to do with packing the boxes, so you really don’t know what’s in them. You don’t really have any experience of missing the contents. But you don’t want to miss out on something that could prove valuable to you. (I’m thinking historical records that you would want to see and retain in some form – digital, I hope.)
And maybe you have siblings who don’t want to deal with the boxes, but they don’t want them discarded, either. Or maybe the boxes contain possessions of a sibling who is no longer with you. Sort of a last man standing issue – a negative tontine (instead of on-going payments, there’s storage space costs. And at the end, the last person alive has to deal with the boxes).
A friend of mine was able to sit down with his mother and go through the boxes with her. Of course, this is ideal and worth a try. You may not deal with everything and may not agree on the value of certain items (don’t push – you will have an opportunity to do what you want too soon), but at least there won’t be too many surprises later on. This can be a great solution for an only child…
My mother and I started going through slides while she was recovering from hip surgery. There were lots of them because my father used them in his work (pre-PowerPoint, folks), so there were lots of slides of animals and people we didn’t know. We started sorting the slides into envelopes for family members who might appreciate them. We actually completed this project several years later while my mother was in skilled nursing. One of my sisters joined us. She just couldn’t give up anything that Dad had created! But at least I didn’t have to deal with those slides. They now are the problem of her children.
My daughter Michele (The Inspired Senior Facebook Page) said a wise thing to me when she asked me to write about this. She said I didn’t have to solve the problem. My job here is to open up the conversation to give our community a place to discuss the issues.